Why has the Taliban banned pictures of living things?

Concerns about press freedom in Afghanistan are growing after the Taliban vowed to impose a law banning news media from publishing images of all living things.

State media outlets in the provinces of Kandahar, Takhar and Maidan Wardak have been advised "not to air or show images of anything with a soul – meaning people and animals", said Arab News, months after warnings that the Taliban's severe morality rules were creating a climate of fear.

Climate of fear

After it seized power in 2021, the Taliban set up a ministry for the "propagation of virtue and the prevention of vice". A 114-page document, published in the summer, set out morality laws that "cover aspects of everyday life like public transportation, music, shaving and celebrations", said Associated Press.

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A UN report said the ministry's role was expanding into other areas of public life, including media monitoring, with controversial news rules for journalists including a ban on putting out any content seen to contradict the Taliban's extreme interpretation of Islamic law.

A spokesperson for the Taliban ministry said the prohibition on publishing images of living things will be introduced gradually because "coercion has no place in the implementation of the law". Efforts have already started to implement the law in the southern Taliban stronghold of Kandahar, the neighbouring Helmand province and northern Takhar, said the spokesperson, but the process "has not started in all provinces".

Dragged into darkness

Even before the new law was announced, Taliban officials in Kandahar were banned from taking photos and videos of living things. "Now it applies to everyone", said the ministry spokesperson. He added that the prohibition is currently "only advice", and the ministry would focus on "convincing people these things are really contrary" to sharia law and "must be avoided”.

Afghan journalists said they have been assured that they would be able to continue their work. One told AFP that the ministry has advised journalists to take photos from further away and film fewer events "to get in the habit".

The news is "sparking concerns about the consequences for Afghan media and press freedom", said ABC News. The rules are "bizarre", said The Independent and "no other Muslim-majority country imposes similar restrictions", including Iran and Saudi Arabia.

It is "dragging Afghanistan into darkness", said Shabnam Nasimi, the former policy advisor to the Minister for Afghan Resttlement, on social media, and remembering how the Taliban banned television between 1996 and 2001, she said it was "shameful that we stand by, watching history repeat itself".